Identification of molecular structure has become very important in many industries. In particular, biological molecules such as nucleic acids and proteins are analyzed to form the basis of clinical diagnostic assays. The procedures utilized often involve large numbers of repetitive steps which consume large amounts of time. With the advent of large projects such as the human genome project, faster and less complex techniques are required.
Simpler and quicker analysis of molecules has been provided by the development of devices often referred to as bio-chips, which are arrays of test sites formed on a substrate. Each of the plurality of test sites includes probes therein to bond with target molecules from samples applied to the device. The binding of a molecule to a probe is noted, thereby identifying the molecule.
As the number of test sites in an array is increased, the complexity of fabricating the array or pluralities of arrays is greatly increased. Conventionally, placing bio-molecules as probes on specific test sites is time consuming, expensive, often lacks the desired accuracy and does not meet the desired size constraints. Placement of bio-molecules for probes is conventionally accomplished by in-situ synthesis using photolithography, which is very labor intensive with unsatisfactory accuracy; mechanical spotting, which is a slow process with the smallest test site size limited by the nature of the process; or chemical ink jetting, having an inaccuracy similar to in-situ synthesis and test site size limits similar to mechanical spotting. Furthermore, each of these techniques is generally limited to the formation of single arrays.
It would be highly advantageous, therefore, to remedy the foregoing and other deficiencies inherent in the prior art.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved apparatus and method for fabricating one or more arrays of test sites.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method wherein a plurality of arrays of test sites are formed simultaneously.
And another object of the present invention is to provide a method using adjustable orthogonal acoustic waves to place bio-molecule probes at test sites.